


Tempus Fugit

by Hattingmad



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Dubcon Kissing, F/M, Patch 5.3: Reflections in Crystal Spoilers, Romantic Soulmates, Solus zos Galvus | Emet-Selch Needs a Hug, Soul Sex, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-18
Updated: 2020-10-18
Packaged: 2021-03-09 00:33:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27085639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hattingmad/pseuds/Hattingmad
Summary: She is the one thing in the universe that he is utterly sure of. She was his, and she will be again.She will. She will.
Relationships: Solus zos Galvus | Emet-Selch/Warrior of Light
Comments: 6
Kudos: 77
Collections: Final Fantasy XIV - Emet-Selch x WoL Recommendations





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TenkeyLess](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TenkeyLess/gifts).



> For Tenkeyless, who asked for Emet/Wol soulmates, resistant-Wol, Emet stealing Wol away at Gulg, a little dubcon, and a happy/hopeful ending. Fingers crossed that I incorprated all the elements.

When he sees her, he knows. How could he not, after an eternity of searching for that exact shade of blue? His twin flame. His second self. His bonded. His soul’s match. She doesn’t see  _ him,  _ of course. Not yet. Not until he makes his entrance, makes his introductions to her rag-tag group of hangers-on. 

Azem, always with the entourage--sorry,  _ companions,  _ as she kept insisting he call them, that adorable pout on her face when he pointed out for the fifth, or fifteenth, or fiftieth time that she seemed to be doing the majority of the work. 

He sees her, and he feels the invisible tug of their bond settling into place, that abraded wound in his soul, rubbed raw and burnt these thousands of years, finally salved by the presence of his  _ flamme jumelle.  _

Triumph. Satisfaction. Everything he has worked for. All the Rejoinings. It has all been worth it, to have her again. For if his soul, unbroken, can recognize hers, patchwork as it is, that means there is  _ enough  _ of her, now, for the bond to form. 

It has been so very long since he felt anything remotely resembling hope. 

The cynic in him tries to counsel caution, tries to reason--she has been corrupted by her Mother, by Her lies. She will not want him, will not listen, will never  _ trust  _ him, he is clad in the garb of her enemies, their blood stains her hands--he smothers that voice, strangles it in the cradle. Azem is the one thing in the universe that he is utterly sure of. She was his, and she will be again. 

She will. She will.

He reveals himself, watching as sets of eyes snap to him in suspicion and animosity, nothing to which he is unaccustomed. But  _ her  _ eyes. Oh. There is suspicion there, yes, but also confusion. Also...those feline ears swivel and flatten, her head tilting as she attempts to make sense of him, of what she is surely feeling, though she cannot place it. And when he passes his hand over his face, the whole of his glyph awash in red, something akin to recognition flashes in her eyes, sparks in her soul, and she glances down for a second at her covered wrist before shaking her head. 

He doesn’t comment on it, only smiles; it would be no good, to give the game away so soon. 

And when she seeks him out later to ask him seemingly idle questions--chatter she seems to reserve for him alone, her words too precious to waste upon her companions without necessity--he teases and prods at her, because he can afford to, because he  _ knows _ ...she’s already circling him. Already curious. Already, she senses how different he is to the other Ascians; already, she wonders  _ why.  _ He will drop clues. He will linger at the edges of her vision, keep himself always in the corners of her mind. And she will seek him, and she will find him, and  _ oh _ , how he longs to be found by her and only her. 

It’s only a matter of time.

* * *

She eats the bloody sandwiches the pathetic Exarch leaves her. Of course she does. The damn cat won’t make his feelings known, though his pitiable pining is obvious to everyone with eyes. 

_ He  _ could do that, Emet thinks. He could offer her so much more than  _ sandwiches.  _ In his lifetime as Solus, he could have hand-fed her delicacies from across seas. As a sorcerer of eld, he could conjure wines from long-lost civilizations, from other sundered shards, delights to tempt the tongue and engulf the senses. He could shower her with gifts, drape her body in jewels and silks, lay her down upon a bed of flowers and speak words of love and seduction as he anointed her with precious oils. 

And she wouldn’t touch any of it, if she knew it was from him. She’s stubborn in this life, infuriatingly so. Intoxicatingly so. She’s stubborn like his Azem was stubborn. No matter. For all their temporarily shared species, she will never belong to the cat. She belongs to him, to her Hades, now and always. 

She’ll remember that. She will. 

He has time.

* * *

“Fancy meeting you here, hero,” he drawls, spotting her lounging along a tree branch. It seems the light, both within and without, has taken its toll on more than just him, and she seeks the meager shade these leaves provide, an arm draped languorously down off her perch. He cannot resist the temptation. He grasps her wrist in white-gloved fingers and turns her palm over, pushing up her armillae and hungrily drinking in the sight of his mark engraved upon her skin.   
  
“That’s an interesting tattoo,” he says, feigning cluelessness, idle curiosity. “Wherever did you get the idea for it?”   
  
She tries to tug her arm from his grasp, resisting him, even now, even as their contact and proximity must be luring her to permit him this indiscretion. He holds fast, staring up with the golden gaze Azem loved so well, found so arresting, and he hears her breath catch in her throat, watches as her pupils blow wide. Her tail flicks irritably, and he finds himself amused by how transparent her emotions are in this form, knowing the irritation is for herself, not for him.

“It isn’t,” she says, trying for curtness but missing the mark somewhat, as he listens without (visible) guile. “A tattoo, I mean. I’ve always had it. I...thought it looked a little like wings, when I was younger.” She snorts. “I guess we both know better, now.”

So she’s made the connection, then.

“Why, hero, if your Mother isn’t adequate protection for you, I’d be happy to fill in as your guardian angel,” he tells her.

“The angel of what? Truth, I suppose?” Even as she says it, the words tripping off her tongue like she wasn’t expecting to pick  _ that  _ trait to describe him, he sees that she knows it to be correct. Color steals up her cheeks, like she’s embarrassed to have complimented him, even by happenstance. And yet, she said it, so she must know...he will never lie. Not to her. Never to her.

His expression gentles, and he releases her wrist, but not before tracing his thumb along his sigil again; he has been doing it this whole time, watching the gooseflesh rise on her arm at the continued touch, her eyelids dropping to half-mast, unable to stay utterly on her guard.

“Come down,” he invites her, sitting down against the trunk and smoothing out his skirts. “Come ask me some more of those pointless questions you’re so fond of. I’m in a giving mood, today.”

She watches him from her perch, thinking about it. He feels her longing, feels how she sways toward him, the pulse of interest and pleasure in her aether; she  _ likes  _ having his attention, wants to say yes.

He feels, too, the moment she shuts down, pulling away.   
  
“I don’t know what this is,” she says, gesturing to him, to her wrist, to all of it. “But I know I shouldn’t trust it.”

“No, my dear,” he corrects, closing his eyes, “you know you  _ want  _ to trust it. You’re merely afraid of something that feels so much larger than yourself. Mortality is truly an inconvenience that way, I’ve observed.”

“I should go,” she says, and he hears her moving away.

On their next meeting, perhaps. He’s seen the way she looks at him when she thinks he isn’t watching (he’s always watching).

And he has nothing but time on his side.

* * *

“You said you were tempered by Zodiark, before,” she begins, and he can think of several turns this conversation could take, amusing himself with the permutations, before he deigns to answer.

“What of it?”

“Well, it’s just that...you don’t  _ seem  _ very tempered.”

“Why, thank you, Warrior,” he responds, like it’s a compliment. “Neither do you.” Politely returning it, even.

“What?” Oh, her face. It’s delightful.

“Your Mother,” he explains, patiently as he’s able. “Surely you didn’t think you’d escaped Her influence? Curious, Her choosing  _ you _ , considering your nature… your people are nocturnal, are they not? How appropriate, then, that you are here known as the Warrior of  _ Darkness _ . More apt than your previous titles, no doubt. One might even say you temporarily do the bidding of our Lord, in bringing back the night, though by thwarting His servants, it could also be argued...oh, never mind, it’s all very tedious.” 

His shoulders slump a bit more in exhaustion (in boredom? In defeat?) and she says,

“Don’t.”

“Don’t what?”

“You should always stand tall,” she says, her thumb rubbing over his sigil under her sleeve, a nervous habit she has picked up, and it cannot be coincidence that she used Azem’s exact words. She must know something. She  _ must.  _

It’s a soothing gesture, he knows, awareness tingling his skin each time she traces the lines that make up his mark, to block pain or discomfort, her subconscious urging her to give in, even as her reason dictates he and his ilk are her enemies. Even as she mistrusts what she feels for him, not knowing  _ why  _ she feels it. Not remembering. 

She has it backwards, he thinks. The mark isn’t what causes their bond. Their bond is what made the mark. His most cherished creation, a concept to span time and space and reality itself, a symbol to show they were tied, body and soul, pledged to one another. Well. He is no longer body,  _ only  _ soul, and he took up his mark, incorporated it into his sigil, when Ascian he became. 

Always, he has worn his heart on his sleeve.

“Perhaps love tempered me before Zodiark ever could,” he tells her, and she stares at him, trying to discern if he’s joking or not, before deciding on the former. 

“Very funny,” she grumbles, shaking her head.

“I’m hilarious. Stay awhile and find out.”

“You’re Garlean. They’re famous for their lack of a sense of humor, Nero notwithstanding.”

“I  _ look  _ Garlean. I’m of the First People to--”   
“Pretty sure knock-knock jokes were invented after the Sundering, then, because all the Ascians I’ve met so far? Not especially funny.”

“I hope you aren’t using Lahabrea as your point of reference,” he calls after her retreating form. “Or Elidibus. Or Nabriales--” Ah. Hm. He sees her point.

Still. Azem loved his sense of humor. ‘Dark as a sky without stars’, she always said.

He’s pretty sure it was a compliment.

But he’s in no rush, he tells himself, even as he longs to chase after her, to pick her up and twirl her around in dizzying circles until she laughs and hits him, making him stumble back, almost tripping on the hem of his Convocation robe…

Azem was difficult to crack, too. (Was she? Was she, really? Or is that just what he tells himself, when he doubts?)

He has time.


	2. Chapter 2

She’s defeated Vauthry, not that he was anticipating a different outcome, and her soul, her beautiful soul, is threaded through with so many hairline cracks, toxic Light pouring out everywhere, and it’s only by some miracle, her sheer stubbornness of will, that she holds herself together, does not become a monstrosity this instant. 

But she is in pain, and she is failing, and she  _ will fail,  _ and there’s  _ no time,  _ and he will not bear witness to it.

He’s already pointing his gun at the Exarch, already taking the shot, hearing himself say “--will succeed, but ours,” but in his head, he’s running the calculations. What are the odds that, as per his original plan, she will actually come  _ alone  _ to Amaurot, without dragging her band of merry misfits with her? What are the odds that she will, for once in her lives, listen to him now, when she never has before? What are the odds that she will manage to hold the Light in long enough to… 

No.

Change of plans.

He will play the villain once more to save her soul.

“Take my hand,  _ hero,  _ lest you wish the same fate for all your companions,” he threatens, stealing their voices and their ability to move with a gesture. ‘Where are you taking her’, ‘what will you do to her’, blah blah blah. Idiot children. He won’t suffer their yammering any longer, that’s one bonus to all this.

And she, noble and self-sacrificing she, steels her resolve, nods, and places her hand in his. They’re gone before her party finishes falling to the floor, released from his hold.

* * *

“Why did you shoot the Exarch?” She demands.

“Would you believe my finger slipped?” He asks with a sidelong smirk and a raised brow. “No? Mm. Thought not. Pity. That isn’t important. What’s important is, you’re mortal. What’s important is, you’re dying. And I can fix you. But you have to trust me. You have to let me in.”

“Trust you?!” She half-shrieks. “How could I possibly trust you, when you just--when you--”

“Don’t play the fool, we haven’t the time,” he hisses, gripping her by the shoulders, shaking her a little, forcing her to look into his eyes. “You’ve felt our connection. What we share. You know I won’t hurt you. You know why I want to save you. Say it.”

“It’s…this mark. It links us, or it’s the external manifestation of a link that was already there. It feels like I know you. Knew you, before we ever met. Like I can trust you. Like I...want to be  _ close _ . But--it’s not real, it can’t be--” She breaks off, retching more light aether into the violet expanse into which he has brought them.

“It is. Stop denying me.” He’s relentless, hands cupping her cheeks, threading into her hair, pinning her in place with his touch and his heavy gaze. “My Wanderer. My Azem. I won’t lose you a second time. Remember me. Remember us.”

It’s a command. It’s a plea. It is both and neither.

And his lips are upon hers, and she startles, gasping, and he licks into her mouth, pulling her to him, pressing close. She’s stiff for an instant, and then all at once she sways toward him, a marionette with her strings all cut, resistance fading. 

“I can’t,” she protests, because she knows she should. “This is wrong-”

“Nothing has ever been more right,” he counters, and seals her arguments away with another kiss. She whimpers against him, fingers clutching at him, an aborted effort to push him away turning, inevitable as the tide, into fists in the fabric of his garments, pulling him closer instead.

He snaps by her ear and his Garlean raiment transforms into his Ascian robes, his sigil glowing on his face, no barrier to their connection, but to fix her, he requires his connection to Zodiark at its strongest. Only His darkness can snuff out this light.

His aether reaches for hers,  _ pulling  _ at their bond, tendrils of darkness wending their way in through the cracks of her being, snuffing out the toxic corruption she has been forced to bear, finding their way to the battered blue and caressing, coaxing…

She moans with relief, with sparking pleasure, soul flaring, the link pulling taut, as she tugs back, tentative at first, then greedy, trying to fill herself with his essence, craving oneness, that mingling of soul that only they two could ever share.

“Yes,” he breathes against her lips, “take your fill of me.”

He pours himself into her and she lets him, no,  _ demands  _ it of him, an embrace more intimate by far than the physical, though he feels that, too, hardening against her hip, almost an afterthought, caught up in his thirst for her. 

_ Let me heal you,  _ he tells her without words, and with every breath, the poison within her dims and drains, until she is again strong enough to touch her soul to his. They brush. They slide along each other’s edges for a moment, and then... _ union.  _ He is she and she is he, and the groan that vibrates through them both has them clawing at each other in an effort to be closer still. 

She pries her lips from his long enough to say, wonderingly, the name shaped on her tongue for the first time in this form, but perfect, so perfect,

“...Hades? Is it...truly you?”

“You remember,” he gasps, and her expression clouds, then clears.

“I didn’t,” she tells him, shaking her head, “not until just now. Not everything, but your soul, it’s...I remember this. I remember  _ you. _ ” 

And that’s enough. That will always be enough. She’s apologizing, telling him she doesn’t know why she was fighting so hard, but he doesn’t care. It doesn’t matter. How could anything matter, other than this? He snaps again, and skin touches skin, and he is inside her by the time her tears finish gathering at her lashes. He feels her pleasure as his own, spiraling higher and higher to that peak of ecstatic completion he could never achieve with anyone else.

“I love you,” he tells her.  _ I love you. I love you.  _

And in every gasp and moan, in every breath, in every flutter of her soul around his, he feelshearstastes her say it back.

Without conscious thought, he has transported them to Amaurot, and her back hits the mattress of a bed designed for much larger beings, even as he drives into her again. Again. Sharing breath, life, soul, love. Connected in every possible way. He presses a kiss to the inside of her wrist where his mark,  _ their  _ mark, lies, and she shudders and clenches and falls apart around him, bringing him to completion as he pulses and paints her inside and out.

And he knows, now, he  _ knows _ , that as long as she trusts him, as long as she is with him, there is nothing they cannot accomplish, no impossibility they cannot bring to fruition, no future they cannot create.

And they will.

Together.

They have time.


End file.
